


Worthwhile

by haldoor



Series: Parental Involvement [17]
Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Angst, Hope, M/M, Reflection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-16
Updated: 2013-05-16
Packaged: 2017-12-12 01:45:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/805707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haldoor/pseuds/haldoor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><b>Warnings/Spoilers:</b> Spoilers up to and including 3.20<br/><b>Disclaimer:</b> No ownership; no profit<br/><b>Beta:</b> Ran it past <span class="ljuser i-ljuser"></span><a href="http://kaige68.livejournal.com/profile"><img class="i-ljuser-userhead"/></a><a class="i-ljuser-username" href="http://kaige68.livejournal.com/"></a><b>kaige68</b> but all mistakes are my own<br/><b>Summary:</b> Steve reflects on what's important</p><p>Edit: Now posted at Livejournal at last.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Worthwhile

**Author's Note:**

> This is Part 17 of the **Parental Involvement** series about Steve coming to terms with the fact he never told his father about his sexuality. There is some comparing of his uneasy relationship with his father to his current relationship with his mother after her twenty-year absence. This part brings the two time periods together and into the present, taking place some days after **The Jump**

Two deaths in far too short a time, was all Steve could think.

Steve hadn't felt so alone since his mother died. And when Freddie's body couldn't be recovered, there had been no funeral; no confirmation of the certainty of his passing. The only thing Steve could do was push any feelings he had about Freddie and the situation away and concentrate on his father's funeral, and then, when that was over, on finding his father's murderer.

The one thing he hadn't expected out of the whole situation was meeting Detective Danny Williams. New to Hawaii from the New Jersey Police Department, Danny was opinionated, insistent and determined; qualities that resonated deeply with Steve. And despite everything Steve had been through, and the dangers inherent in being attracted to someone who probably had no interest in him, Steve had been intrigued from the moment he met Danny in his father's garage.

Even though he'd initially turned down the governor's offer to head a local task force, it had occurred to Steve that finding out what was behind his father's death was one small thing he could do for the man who – while more distant to his son than a father should be since his mother's death – had been nothing if not quietly supportive when Steve most needed it. Maybe he hadn't told his father things he should have, and maybe Jack hadn't exactly been Father-of-the-Year material, but they were _family_. It was only when Steve was facing Danny in the garage after finding his father's toolbox that he fully understood if he ignored the opportunity he'd been presented to bring Hess and whoever else was behind Jack's death to justice, he would regret it forever.

The fact that _Danny_ was assigned to his father's case, and was not about to let it go easily, had rung bells in Steve's head that were almost as loud as the ones set off by the evidence Jack McGarrett had collected in the old toolbox. Based on that, Steve had made the instantaneous decision to rope Danny into the task force of few restrictions and almost endless resources that the Governor had handed to him on a silver plate.

What he hadn't known at his father's funeral – and hadn't expected despite the feelings he'd tried to ignore all along – was how the relationship between Danny and himself would develop into something so much deeper than mere work colleagues normally experienced.

Time moved on, and so the relationship progressed, growing and binding him more firmly to the amazing, passionate, dedicated man that was Danny. 

The recovery of Freddie's body had brought home to Steve how hard it was to hold on to someone you loved when everything around seemed destined to part you from them. He had made his peace with Freddie – as best he could – on that fateful mission where Freddie had lost his life, but seeing his desiccated – and desecrated – body in that filthy hole in North Korea had brought back feelings that Steve thought he'd long since left behind. 

At the funeral service, Steve felt like his whole world had been ripped apart, but when he glanced up to see his team waiting for him in quiet support, the thought filling his head was _Ohana_. All of them were truly his family, but most especially Danny, who had put up with so much just to be in Hawaii with his daughter. If Danny hadn't been the man he was, Steve's life would have been so much less; a life half-lived, like so much of it before Danny.

Danny made it all worthwhile.

~//~

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry for the delays! The final part of the story has now been completed and I hope to post it in the next day or so. Also... it's a little longer than the 600 words of each of the previous parts. ;-)


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